Gerald Austin

Gerald Austin, Sr is the founder of the Center for Urban Missions and the New City Church, and the father of Birmingham City Council member Johnathan Austin.

Austin was one of nine children raised by a single parent in Birmingham. He attended Phillips High School and earned a bachelor of science in electronics engineering at DeVry University. He went on to complete a master's in theology from Grace Theological Seminary, and a doctorate in ministry from the Bakke Graduate University. He also attended the Harvard Divinity School.

He founded the Center for Urban Missions to help struggling families in the Metropolitan Gardens housing project follow his mother's example of "never making peace with poverty." He later founded the New City Church as an additional outreach to the community, seeking to transcend racial boundaries he recruited numerous white members and staffers to the congregation.

Austin and his wife, Gwen have six children and 12 grandchildren.